Full Description
The contributions of female artists to the development of literary and artistic modernism in early twentieth century France remain poorly understood. It was during this period that a so-called "modern woman" began occupying urban spaces associated with the development of modern art and modernism's struggles to define subjectivities and sexualities. Whereas most studies of modernism's formal innovations and its encouragement of artistic autonomy neglect or omit necessary discussions of gender, race, class, and sexual orientation, the contributors of The Modern Woman Revisited inject these perspectives into the discussion.
Between the two World Wars, Paris served as the setting for unparalleled freedom for expatriate as well as native-born French women, who enjoyed unprecedented access to education and opportunities to participate in public artistic and intellectual life. Many of these women made lasting contributions in art and literature. Some of the artists discussed include Colette, Tamara de Lempicka, Sonia Delaunay, Djuna Barnes, Augusta Savage, and Lee Miller.
Inthis book, an internationally recognized roster of art historians, literary critics, and other scholars offers a nuanced portrait of what it meant to be a modern woman during this decisive period of modernism's development. Individual essays explore the challenges faced by women in the early decades of the twentieth century, as well as the strategies these women deployed to create their art and to build meaningful lives and careers. The introduction underscores the importance of the contributors' efforts to engender larger questions about modernity, sexuality, race, and class.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction / WHITNEY CHADWICK AND TIRIA TRUE LATIMER
PART ONE Imagining Modernity
1. BECOMING MODERN
Gender and Sexual Identity after World War / WHITNEY CHADWICK AND TIRIA TRUE LATIMER
2.GENDER, RACE, AND MISCEGENATION
African Americans in Jazz Age Paris / TYLER STOVALL
3. DECONSECRATING MODERNISM
Allegories of Regeneration in Brooks and Picasso / BRIDGET ELLIOTT
PART TWO Modern Modes
4. "NEVER ADMIT!"
Colette and the Freedom of Paradox / ISABELLE DE COURTIVRON
5. SAMSON AND DELILAH REVISITED
The Politics of Fashion in 1920's France / MARY LOUISE ROBERTS
6. PAINTING THE PERVERSE
Tamara de Lempicka and the Modern Woman Artist / PAULA BIRNBAUM
7. SONIA DELAUNAY'S SIMULTANEOUS FASHIONS AND THE MODERN WOMAN / TAG GRONBERG
PART THREE New Identities
8. LOOKING LIKE A LESBIAN
Portraiture and Sexual Identity in 1920's Paris / TIRZA TRUE LATIMER
9. DJUNA BARNES
Looking Like a Lesbian/Poet / CAROLYN ALLEN
10. SINGULAR PLURAL
Collaborative Self-Images in Claude Cahun's Aveux non avenus / JENNIFER SHAW
11. "SOMETHING HIDDEN, SECRET, AND ETERNAL"
Romaine Brooks, Radclyffe Hall, and the Lesbian Image in The Forge / JOE LUCCHESI
PART FOUR Embodying the Modern
12. MODERN DANCERS AND AFRICAN AMAZONS
Augusta Savage's Sculptures of Women, 1929-1930 / THERESA LEININGER-MILLER
13. LEE MILLER'S TWO BODIES / WHITNEY CHADWICK
14. "LE NUM��RO BARBETTE"
Photography and the Politics of Embodiment in Interwar Paris / AMY LYFORD
APPENDIX: The Napoleonic Civil Code of 1804
Bibliography
Notes on Contributors
Index
